Uploaded July 2019 | Updated September 2026, 1 day ago
crosstowntraffic2018.wordpress.com
This presentation took place as part of the conference Crosstown Traffic: Popular Music Theory and Practice, which was hosted by The University of Huddersfield from September 3 - 5 2018. This event combined the IASPM UK&Ireland Biennial Conference, the 13th Art of Record Production Conference (ARP), an ISMMS conference, and the additional participation of Dancecult.
A recurrent theme within popular music studies has been discussion of how the field can integrate different disciplines and professions, for example exploring both music and its context; involving both practitioners and researchers; and encouraging interdisciplinary and collaborative work. Many different issues make such approaches challenging, and various different popular music focused subject organisations have developed somewhat independently of one another. This conference brought four such groups together, to exchange knowledge, collaborate, and encourage crosstalk.
/// SUPPORT
Popular Music Studies Research Group (PMSRG), University of Huddersfield research.hud.ac.uk/pmsrg/#
Centre for Music, Culture and Identity (CMCI), University of Huddersfield
research.hud.ac.uk/institutes-centres/cmci
The International Association for the Study of Popular Music UK and Ireland Branch (IASPM UK & Ireland)
iaspm.org.uk
Association for the Study of the Art of Record Production (ASARP)
artofrecordproduction.com
Dancecult Research Network (DRN) studies into electronic dance music culture
dancecult-research.net
International Society for Metal Music Studies (ISMMS)
metalstudies.org
/// ORGANIZERS
IASPM UK&I: Rupert Till
ARP: Katia Isakoff, Shara Rambarran
ISMMS: Karl Spracklen
Dancecult: Graham St. John
University of Huddersfield: Jan Herbst, Austin Moore, Lisa Colton, Toby Martin, Catherine Haworth, Mark Mynett
/// CREDITS
This online project was edited, collated, and made available online by Chris McConnell, Jack Zissell, and Colin Frank.
/// PRESENTATION DETAILS
Rebooting the Historical Narrative of a Female Icon: Archival Study and the Interdisciplinary Approach as a Means of Uncovering Previously Unacknowledged Forms of Creative Agency in the Work of Billie Holiday
Jasmine Taylor
/// ABSTRACT
Popular media (such as the film Lady Sings the Blues, 1972) has tended to focus on Billie Holiday’s chaotic personal life rather than on her creative agency. This research aims to bring Holiday’s creative output to the forefront, in order to reveal original reinterpretations of her work in the context of music and gender. In this paper it will be argued that even in the case of well-known female jazz “stars” such as Holiday, it is possible for significant aspects of their work to be obscured or erased, and thus for her historical contribution to the jazz and popular music genres to be diminished. The major research on Holiday’s life and work was written before the interdisciplinary approach advocated by the “new jazz studies” (particularly “gender” as a category of analysis), was able to be utilised, but it is now possible to do this in order to consider aspects of her music making not usually fore fronted, such as her song writing. This approach also made it possible to recover women’s culture and women as historical actors and also challenge a dominant jazz discourse where the contributions of women have often been erased or misrepresented. Nevertheless, modern day scholars have to wrestle with the pros and cons of the retrospective application of the interdisciplinary approach to the original archive material.
Beyond adding to the area of Holiday scholarship, this approach contributes to a broader and timely issue concerning histories of female artistic agency and suitable ways to research that methodologically.
crosstowntraffic2018.wordpress.com
This presentation took place as part of the conference Crosstown Traffic: Popular Music Theory and Practice, which was hosted by The University of Huddersfield from September 3 - 5 2018. This event combined the IASPM UK&Ireland Biennial Conference, the 13th Art of Record Production Conference (ARP), an ISMMS conference, and the additional participation of Dancecult.
A recurrent theme within popular music studies has been discussion of how the field can integrate different disciplines and professions, for example exploring both music and its context; involving both practitioners and researchers; and encouraging interdisciplinary and collaborative work. Many different issues make such approaches challenging, and various different popular music focused subject organisations have developed somewhat independently of one another. This conference brought four such groups together, to exchange knowledge, collaborate, and encourage crosstalk.
/// SUPPORT
Popular Music Studies Research Group (PMSRG), University of Huddersfield research.hud.ac.uk/pmsrg/#
Centre for Music, Culture and Identity (CMCI), University of Huddersfield
research.hud.ac.uk/institutes-centres/cmci
The International Association for the Study of Popular Music UK and Ireland Branch (IASPM UK & Ireland)
iaspm.org.uk
Association for the Study of the Art of Record Production (ASARP)
artofrecordproduction.com
Dancecult Research Network (DRN) studies into electronic dance music culture
dancecult-research.net
International Society for Metal Music Studies (ISMMS)
metalstudies.org
/// ORGANIZERS
IASPM UK&I: Rupert Till
ARP: Katia Isakoff, Shara Rambarran
ISMMS: Karl Spracklen
Dancecult: Graham St. John
University of Huddersfield: Jan Herbst, Austin Moore, Lisa Colton, Toby Martin, Catherine Haworth, Mark Mynett
/// CREDITS
This online project was edited, collated, and made available online by Chris McConnell, Jack Zissell, and Colin Frank.
/// PRESENTATION DETAILS
Rebooting the Historical Narrative of a Female Icon: Archival Study and the Interdisciplinary Approach as a Means of Uncovering Previously Unacknowledged Forms of Creative Agency in the Work of Billie Holiday
Jasmine Taylor
/// ABSTRACT
Popular media (such as the film Lady Sings the Blues, 1972) has tended to focus on Billie Holiday’s chaotic personal life rather than on her creative agency. This research aims to bring Holiday’s creative output to the forefront, in order to reveal original reinterpretations of her work in the context of music and gender. In this paper it will be argued that even in the case of well-known female jazz “stars” such as Holiday, it is possible for significant aspects of their work to be obscured or erased, and thus for her historical contribution to the jazz and popular music genres to be diminished. The major research on Holiday’s life and work was written before the interdisciplinary approach advocated by the “new jazz studies” (particularly “gender” as a category of analysis), was able to be utilised, but it is now possible to do this in order to consider aspects of her music making not usually fore fronted, such as her song writing. This approach also made it possible to recover women’s culture and women as historical actors and also challenge a dominant jazz discourse where the contributions of women have often been erased or misrepresented. Nevertheless, modern day scholars have to wrestle with the pros and cons of the retrospective application of the interdisciplinary approach to the original archive material.
Beyond adding to the area of Holiday scholarship, this approach contributes to a broader and timely issue concerning histories of female artistic agency and suitable ways to research that methodologically.
